Most of a three-key macro pad featuring a 3D-printed, LEGO-compatible plate.

3D-Printed Macro Pad Plate Is LEGO-Compatible

April 30, 2024 by Kristina Panos 2 Comments

We love LEGO, we love keyboards, and when the two join forces, we’re usually looking at a versatile peripheral that’s practically indestructible. Such seems to be the case with [joshmarinacci]’s LEGO-compatible 3D-printed plate for a three-key macro pad. For a first foray into scratch-built keyboard construction, we think this is pretty great.

The idea here is threefold: the plate holds the switches in place, negates the need for a PCB, and makes it possible to build the case completely out of LEGO. In fact, [joshmarinacci]’s plan for the keycaps even includes LEGO — they are going to 3D print little adapters that fit the key switch’s stem on one side, and the underside of a 2×2 plate on the other.

Although [joshmarinacci]’s plan is to design a PCB for the next version, there is plenty to be said for combining the plate and the PCB by printing guides for the wires, which we’ve seen before. We’ve also seen LEGO used to create a keyboard stand that fits just right.

Via KBD

Bonkers Nerf Blaster Sprays Balls Everywhere

March 14, 2024 by Lewin Day 3 Comments

Nerf blasters are fun toys, to be sure. However, they’re limited by factors like price and safety and what Hasbro thinks parents will put up with. Few caregivers would ever countenance a build like this one from [ItllProbablyWork].

It’s a blaster designed to fire 48 darts in a second or so, or a truly ludicrous 288 Nerf balls. Like so many rapid fire blaster designs, it’s based on a pair of rotating wheels which fling darts out at rapid speed. The trick to the rapid fire ability is the delivery of ammunition. In this case, the blaster has a rotating drum of 12 barrels, which can each be loaded with 4 darts or 24 balls. As the drum rotates into position, a trigger mechanism unlatches a spring which forces the contents of the barrel out through the wheels and on to the target.

It’s mostly pretty good with darts, but with balls, it tends to send them flying everywhere, including jamming a bunch into the blaster’s internals. It is very funny to watch, though.

We’ve seen some other great blaster builds recently, too. Video after the break.

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A Kyria split keyboard and wrist rests on a stand made of LEGO.

LEGO Keyboard Stand Fits Just Right

March 12, 2024 by Kristina Panos 3 Comments

Split keyboards are great for many reasons, but mostly because you can place the halves as far apart as you want and really give your arms and shoulders the room they need. [Jason Cox] hit the nail on the head, though: add in a couple of palm rests, and you now have four things that will potentially shift and drift out of place on your desk or keyboard tray. It was such a problem that [Jason] hardly ever used his Kyria. That is, until he built a stand out of LEGO to hold everything.

[Jason] was using a pair of Manfrotto pocket tripods to tent the keyboard, and those held their position surprisingly well, even though he tweaked them here and there over time. Ultimately, [Jason] knew he wanted the answer to be something customizable. And what’s more customizable than LEGO?

About $60 worth of new white bricks and plates later, [Jason] got to work, spending an evening building the thing. He ended up using a few bricks to hold the keyboard in place on the plate, and it worked perfectly.

Of course, he didn’t get the whole contraption exactly how he wanted it the first time, but tweaking builds is half the fun, right? After a while, [Jason] figured out he could rebuild the part that connects the two keyboard halves to go around a plastic piece at the back of the keyboard tray, which holds the whole thing in place. The end result? Wonderful. The Kyria stays in place, and now [Jason] is using it way more than before.

You know LEGO is versatile, but did you know you can use it to build a hydroelectric dam?

Via reddit

Build Yourself A Little Mangonel, You Deserve One

March 1, 2024 by Lewin Day 17 Comments

If you’re of a certain age, you almost certainly learned about mangonels by playing Age of Empires II. Any intermediate player will tell you they are a powerful siege weapon that nevertheless cannot destroy trees (in game). However, why limit yourself to experiencing this capable siege engine in digital form? With the help of [Arry Koster’s] design, you can build a little mangonel of your very own!

A good-looking siege engine is, more often than not, a well-performing one.

The build is intended for a student or hobbyist audience, and is for a mangonel roughly the size of a shoebox. That’s big enough to have some fun, without being so large as to get you into trouble. The project also comes complete with a useful spreadsheet that lets you simulate the performance of a mangonel hurling a projectile so you can better understand the physics involved.

The mangonel is constructed out of wood, just as medieval examples were. The guide explains how to put the the design together, including the use of graphite to lubricate moving parts — a technique also used historically. Beyond building the siege weapon itself, there are also instructions on how to instrument it with an Arduino to measure its performance accurately.

The only thing this project is missing is a brilliant video of the titchy siege machine in action. We want to see it knocking down some appropriately-sized castles! If you happen to be building your own siege engines, miniature or otherwise, don’t hesitate to drop us a line. Do include some excellent footage of your antics, to boot!

Recreating The Pop Ball

February 24, 2024 by Kristina Panos 14 Comments

Those who were kids in the 80s may remember a sweet little toy called the Pop Ball. A simple rubber hemisphere, this rubber cup could be turned inside out and thrown on the ground, where it would hit and bounce sky high whilst knocking itself right side out. The black ones worked particularly well, and were the first to be banned from [electrosync]’s school along with yo-yos, slap bracelets, and any number of toys that eventually became weaponized by enterprising children.

An industrial Vegemite injection-molded version that only kind of worked.

You can still find Pop Balls today, but they don’t work nearly as well as they did originally because of a lower Shore hardness in the rubber. Naturally, as an adult with futuristic toys at hand, [electrosync] just had to try re-creating the ’80s version. But it wasn’t easy.

They started by studying the patents and anything else they could find. They even managed to get a hold of Peter Fish, the original creator of the Pop Ball, to get some questions answered about the things. According to Peter, the black Pop Ball was made from recycled rubber and worked almost too well. Peter sent [electrosync] an old-stock Pop Ball, which they used to modify their CAD design.

It’s easy to root for [electrosync] throughout this journey, which consists of many failed prints and injection molding attempts. At last, they are able to at least recreate the snap of the modern Pop Ball once they finally found the right filament — the extremely elastic Recreus Filaflex 60A TPU. Of course, it wasn’t all lollipops and rainbows from there, because the filament is notoriously difficult to print with, but [electrosync] made it work. Check it out after the break.

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LEGO Coin Sorter Is So Money

February 5, 2024 by Kristina Panos 4 Comments

When it comes to LEGO and sorting, the idea is usually to sort bricks by color, which is a great way to help keep your sanity. And if you want to buy more, you may need to save your pennies and so on. What better way for worlds to collide than to build a working LEGO coin sorter?

[brickstudios]’ sorter does it all — pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters, half-dollars, and dollars. As with most coin sorters, the idea is to differentiate by size. This brings up challenge number one — the fact that a penny is ever-so-slightly bigger than a dime.

[brickstudios] was able to solve this by leveraging the difference between a headlight brick and a regular modified 1X1 with a stud on the side. Later, the same two coins reveal challenge two, which is that if you want to sort the coins in order by value, you have to somehow get the dimes past the pennies and nickels after each has fallen through the chute. Same deal with the giant half-dollar and smaller dollar coins.

The basic sub-build is a pair of tile rails on which the coins slide and either fall into the hole or keep going based on value. Once [brickstudios] had all the coins falling just right, it was time to address the value vs. size issue. Essentially, they solved this by building a ramp that turns the dimes and dollars and gets them to the right spots. Be sure to check out the build video after the break.

We are constantly amazed by the things people can make out of LEGO, like this hydroelectric dam or this hydraulic excavator. Have you made something amazing? Let us know!

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A child in a red shirt and blue pants balances on a board suspended across two small, green sawhorses. An astroturf hill and blue elephant-esque cart are in the background.

Popup Playground Roams Around

February 4, 2024 by Navarre Bartz 4 Comments

Going to the park is a time-honored pastime for kids around the world, but what if there isn’t one nearby? COMPA Teatro Trono and the International Design Clinic have designed a park that can come to you.

Working with a group of design students from Bolivia and America, the theatre troupe has iteratively designed a set of playground carts that can be deployed for kids to meet each other and play. El Alto, the city of 1 million where the playground plies the streets, has grown exponentially since its incorporation as an independent town in 1985. Infrastructure has trouble catching up with population jumps of 54% like that experienced from 2000-2010.

Starting with interviews with kids from the city about what was important for a playground, they found a trend of trees, slides, and the color green. Over the course of three summers, the design students went from janky prototypes to the more refined carts now seen roaming El Alto built around the idea of “exaggerated topography.” An elephant and “astroturf bee” are the two hand carts which disassemble into a variety of playground equipment once in place at a destination.

Not a ton of details are given in the article about the construction of the carts themselves, but we think this tactical urbanist approach to parks is a hack in itself. That said, be sure to point us toward some more info on the builds if you’ve found any. Know of another hack, that brings joy to your own neighborhoods? Send it to the tipsline!